


the flash of light on a burial shroud

by electriceell



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-06
Updated: 2018-03-25
Packaged: 2019-03-01 07:04:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,235
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13289601
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/electriceell/pseuds/electriceell
Summary: Fill for KM (prompt: https://daredevilkink.dreamwidth.org/8773.html?thread=18515525#cmt18515525)Daredevil talks down a jumper.Title from Jumper by Third-Eye Blind because I literally could not stop myself





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Relatively obvious trigger warning, but this entire story is surrounding a suicide attempt and suicidal ideation
> 
> I'm not sure how realistic this is or if it will ring true for any of you. I tried. (As a point of reference I have been talked down from a suicide attempt, however it was not by a stranger) 
> 
> Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255 (they also have a chat if you, like me, get anxious about talking on the phone)  
> Crisis Textline: 741-741  
> Trevor Lifeline: 1-866-488-7386  
> Teen Suicide Hotline: 1-800-USA-KIDS (872-5437)  
> The International Association for Suicide Prevention: http://www.iasp.info/resources/Crisis_Centres

He hears the jagged breathing and pounding heartbeat before he can smell the anxiety rolling off the kid two blocks over. It had been an altogether quiet night for Daredevil and Matt had been allowing his mind to drift to Karen and Foggy and how he had fucked everything up. He was still trying to shake his train of thought off which is why he doesn’t notice that something is off. It isn’t until he gets over to the rooftop and he realizes it.

 

One heartbeat. One person.

 

One person crying mutely and teetering dangerously close to the edge of the building.

 

“No,” slips out in Matt’s voice before he can think.

 

The person on the ledge turns around carelessly and for a fraction of a second Matt thinks they’re going to slip, going to fall before he can do anything and _no, no, no, that cannot happen_.

 

A humorless chuckle cuts through the air.

 

“You have got to be fucking kidding me,” the person, it sounds like a man to Matt, murmurs through tears. “Just my luck that fucking Daredevil would come and try to save me. New flash, man, there are people who actually need saving, not worthless assholes like me, so you can move along.”

 

Matt takes a deep breath and he can taste this man’s fear and desperation in the air. “You know I can’t do that.” He approaches slowly.

 

“You really can,” the guy pauses to wipe his face and sniffles, “and you should stay away from me. Please don’t get closer. I just… I need to do this.” He takes a deep breath and starts to turn back around.

 

“No!” Matt shouts and pulls up short. “Please, I won’t come any closer. Please just don’t. Why don’t you just tell me what’s going on,” the guy scoffs, “or at least tell me your name?” Matt cringes internally at how stupid and useless and desperate he sounds.

 

“Brandon,” he huffs out. “I don’t know why I’m telling you this,” Brandon says more to himself than Matt, “it won’t matter in a minute. Not that it really matters now.”

 

“Why? Why doesn’t it matter Brandon?”

 

“Why do you care?” Brandon shouts, and then deflates, body sagging. “Just leave me alone Daredevil. Go save someone worth saving.”

 

“That’s what I’m trying to do,” Matt says and wants to hit himself for saying something so trite. “I… I know more about this kind of thing than you might think. Why don’t you try telling me and if you’re still sure this is your only option I’ll just leave you alone.” If Matt had to guess, he would say that Brandon was now looking at him like he was crazy. Great. Perfect Murdock. You scared the suicidal man with your own insanity.

“Promise?” Brandon asks, hesitantly.

 

“I’m a man of my word,” Matt says, which, according to Foggy, is pretty far from the truth, but he’s trying. He’s really trying. Maybe Daredevil can at least be an honest man.

 

Brandon sighs and wipes away a fresh wave of tears. “This is going to sound so ridiculous to you… it’s not even like I have good reason to be here. I just want it to be done. Nothing terrible or traumatic happened to me, if that’s what you’re expecting. I just… my life is just worthless and I’m tired of trying to pretend it isn’t.”

 

“I’m sure that’s not true,” Matt tries, even if he understands what this guy means.

 

“How can you be sure of that? And don’t give me any of that ‘all lives have worth’ crap because we both know it isn’t true. You see the scum that stalks these streets. And I’m not them. I’m just nothing. I have nothing, so why bother? I just hurt the people around me. My best…” a little sob slips out, “my _ex_ -best friend told me as much. ‘You’re too much,’ she said, ‘you lie and you refuse to take care of yourself or get help. You make me party to your misery… and I just can’t anymore.’ She was crying when she left my apartment. Most of me died when I watched her walk out that door. I’m just finishing the job now… She said we could fix it if I got help. But why bother? I’m going to keep having depression and I’m going to keep hurting people, so why not do the right thing and just take myself out of the picture?” Brandon dissolves into little hiccupping sobs.

 

Matt has to bite back his own tears as Foggy pops into his mind. That’s different though. Matt has no excuse.

 

“Brandon, you’re sick. That isn’t your fault, but you can get help and get better. It sounds like your friend really wants you to get better. I bet if you called her right now she would beg you to get off this ledge.”

 

“Oh my God,” Brandon croaks. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me. Of course she would beg to me to get off this ledge. She’s a good person, some part of her probably still cares about me. But then what? She doesn’t want me in her life. Not like this. So I go back to my pathetic, lonely, empty life and I end up on this ledge tomorrow, next week, next month. What does it matter?

 

You just don’t get it. You’re this badass vigilante, who spends every night saving the world. You’re a person that this world needs, that this world values. You probably have your own Lois Lane waiting to help you out of your costume at night and clean up your cuts. Probably got a huge circle of friends from whatever benign, Clark Kent-esque day job you have. When you aren’t saving the world you’re probably grabbing a beer with friends and watching the game like a normal dude. I don’t have that. I don’t have _anything_. You couldn’t understand.”

 

It’s Matt’s turn to bark out a humorless laugh.

 

“Brandon, I don’t have any friends left. My girlfriend died because of Daredevil. When I’m not out as Daredevil I am sitting miserably at home, trying to read and forget how damn miserable I am. Listen…” Matt crouches down, overcome with a sudden exhaustion. Brandon mimics his movement, sitting down on the ledge. “My best friend, honestly one of the only real friends I’ve ever had, walked out on me. And it hurt so damn much. But it was my fault. I was hurting him. And I didn’t think I had it in me to stop hurting him so I told him to leave. Believe me, if I wasn’t Daredevil, if I didn’t think that Hell’s Kitchen needed him, I might be on that ledge myself. I get that it hurts Brandon. I do.”

 

“But…” Brandon starts, “you’re Daredevil. You can do anything. You’re amazing.”

 

“No,” Matt mumbles, “I’m just a man.” He’s crying. He can’t keep it back. It feels like all the agony from the past few months is finally pouring out of him. Briefly, he wonders what it looks like, tears streaming out from behind the devil mask. “I’m just a man and so are you Brandon. If you believe that I can do anything, you have to believe that of yourself too.”

 

“I’m scared,” Brandon whispers, sounding unsure for the first time. “What if I try to get better and don’t? What if I fail?”

 

“What if you fail? You keep trying. You get back up and…” Matt breathes deeply, “and you get the help you need when you need it.”

 

Matt is such a fucking hypocrite. There’s a damn good reason he doesn’t have friends.

 

Brandon scoots off of the ledge and onto the roof. “Alright,” he murmurs and stumbles towards Matt, “alright.”

 

And Matt folds him into a hug because it seems like the right thing to do. Because… because it’s what Foggy would do.


	2. Chapter 2

Brandon is in the hospital and his best friend is at his side before Matt gets the call. He ignores it at first, but it keeps coming in. He checks his burner, worried something has happened to Claire, but it’s Foggy’s voice he hears on the other end.

 

“Hey,” Foggy starts.

 

“Hey,” Matt replies, unsure of what prompted this.

 

“So, a video of Daredevil talking down a jumper just popped up on Youtube…” Foggy starts.

 

“Tell him he’s a goddamn hypocrite,” Matt hears Karen yell in the background. Foggy sighs heavily.   


“Just… swing by my apartment if you have it in you. Karen and I are both here and would like to talk to you.”

 

“Yea, Fog,” Matt chokes out, “yea, I’ll be there soon.”  
  
Matt’s not sure he can handle another round of _this_. He already feels like he’s been cut open and gutted and now Foggy and Karen are going to pour salt in it. It isn’t that he doesn’t deserve it. No, he absolutely deserves anything they want to throw at him and more because Matt knows Foggy and Karen don’t have the capacity for hurting people that he does. He’ll never make up for all the lying and betrayal. Never.

 

Slowly, Matt peels the Daredevil costume off and takes a quick shower. He feels bad making Foggy and Karen wait, but he needs time to collect himself. If his shower takes a little longer than usual because he’s crying and he just can’t make himself move, well there’s another thing Foggy and Karen can be mad at him for.

 

Once he’s dressed, Matt puts on his glasses and grabs his cane. The walk to Foggy’s is short, made shorter by the anxiety Matt feels the closer he gets.

 

He takes a deep breath and steels himself before knocking lightly on Foggy’s door.

 

Matt takes in his surroundings, hears Foggy’s light laugh, the sloshing of his beer being transferred from his left to right hand, hears Karen flop onto Foggy’s couch.

 

“Hey Matt,” Foggy starts, sounding relatively light and cheery, all things considered and Matt is taken aback. He knows Foggy would be better off without him, should be happy to excise Matt from his life like the tumor he is, but Matt also thought, selfishly, that Foggy would be sad or upset at the idea of pushing Matt further away. Not casual. Not cheerful. Not like this.

 

Matt hears Foggy’s heartbeat change the minute he takes in Matt’s expression, but that’s all the warning he gets before he’s pulled into a bear hug, Foggy squeezing him tight enough to hurt his fractured ribs. Matt doesn’t say anything though; he just selfishly relishes the warmth and closeness. He tires not to worry about what comes next.

“Let him at least get through the door, Foggy,” Karen calls, approaching in stocking feet, “then I want in on the hugs.”

 

With some effort, Matt pushes himself away from Foggy and walks further into the apartment. Karen rushes towards him and throws her arms around him and Matt hugs her back, only briefly, before stepping back from her.

 

“What’s going on?” Matt asks, an edge of panic in his voice. He’s confused and he doesn’t know where this is going and he just wants to escape the situation.

 

“Relax, Matty,” Foggy starts, his calm voice isn’t enough to cover up the uptick in his heart. He approaches Matt slowly, like a wild animal, and honestly, that’s kind of how Matt feels. Matt feels like a cornered animal and they’re just toying with him instead of going for the swift kill.

 

It’s cruel.

 

He deserves it.

 

“Hey, no, Matty, don’t freak out. You did a really great thing today and we just wanted to talk to you, nothing crazy,” Foggy starts.

 

“We heard some of this shit you said on that rooftop,” Karen interjects, “and if you were just trying to talk that kid down, I get it, but it sounded honest. And Matt… you’re a God damned hypocrite – ”

 

“Language, Karen.”

 

“No Matt, I’ll use any fucking words I want. You’re full of shit and you need to listen to your own advice…” Matt can hear that Karen is holding back tears, “because we don’t want you out on that ledge,” Karen’s voice gets small and broken when she says, “Please don’t make us bury you.”

 

Karen starts crying and Foggy starts sniffling and Matt just wants to tell them that it won’t happen. Wants to pull them close and comfort them. Tell them that he can change. That he buried Elektra and he wouldn’t do the same thing to them.

 

But they all know he can’t make that promise.

 

“I’m sorry,” Matt murmurs. “I’m really sorry I dragged you into this. I’m just… so sorry I’m hurting you.”

 

“Hey, none of that.” Foggy pulls Matt into a hug and then holds him out in front of him, hands on his forearms. “Look, Matty, things may be a little broken between us,” Foggy sweeps one hand around to include Karen, “between all of us, but broken doesn’t mean it can’t be fixed, right? Broken bones heal, we just gotta make sure it sets right. And you have to be willing to try.”

 

“But what if I fail,” Matt hears himself repeat Brandon’s words from the rooftop.

 

Not missing a beat, Foggy repeats Matt’s own words back to him.

 

“You keep trying. You get back up, Matty, and you get the help you need when you need it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wasn't sure where I wanted this to go and it kept evading me. I write this stuff (suicidal Matt) too much and I'm worried I don't have anything new to say :/ 
> 
> Not sure I like this, but I hope you can at least enjoy it :)

**Author's Note:**

> Feel free to find me on [ tumblr](http://electriceell.tumblr.com/)


End file.
